January 2011
14 posts
Foodborne Listeria acquires ability to attack the... →
Listeria monocytogenes is already a virulent species of foodborne bacteria most often found in raw milk, soft-ripened cheeses and ready-to-eat cold cuts. It is particularly tenacious and can thrive even under refrigeration.
Now researchers say some strains of Listeria monocytogenes appear to have acquired an enhanced ability to invade and infect the heart.
Less common than Salmonella or toxic E....
11% US adults have diabetes, 35% "pre-diabetes"... →
Diabetes affects 8.3% of all Americans and 11.3% of adults age 20 and older. Some 27% of people with diabetes – 7 million Americans – do not know they have the disease. In 2010, 1.9 million Americans were first diagnosed with diabetes.
Prediabetes affects 35% of adults age 20 and older, and half of Americans age 65 and older. Prediabetes is a condition in which blood glucose (sugar) levels are...
Forbes' New Changes Mean More Blending of Ads,... →
Forbes Media took a radical step last year when it started to put advertisers and outside contributors on equal footing with its editorial staffers, in print and online. Now, it’s going one step further with a Web redesign that will give advertisers even greater presence on the site.
Under a three-month-old program called AdVoice, advertisers could pay to have their labeled blogs appear alongside...
Must read: Soil Association given libel warning... →
(Nonprofit threatened with UK equivalent of SLAPP suit for voicing concerns over a CAFO. NB, under UK law,unlike in the US, something can be true and still be libellous.)
When a charity objected to plans for a pig factory for up to 25,000 animals, they expected a fight. But now the battle looks likely to intensify after the leading London lawyers Carter Ruck threatened libel proceedings.
The...
After $1b spent, Pentagon shifts strategy on... →
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon is scaling back one of its largest efforts to develop treatments for troops and civilians infected in a germ warfare attack after a $1 billion, five-year program fell short of its primary goal.
Even the heavy infusion of research cash and a unified effort by university labs and biotech companies from Boston to California were insufficient to break through limitations of...
The Age-Old Struggle against the... →
Since the introduction of the first vaccine, there has been opposition to vaccination. In the 19th century, despite clear evidence of benefit, routine inoculation with cowpox to protect people against smallpox was hindered by a burgeoning antivaccination movement. The result was ongoing smallpox outbreaks and needless deaths. In 1910, Sir William Osler publicly expressed his frustration with the...
WTF? "'New Delhi' superbug named unfairly, says... →
Naming a drug-resistant superbug after the Indian capital Delhi was an “error of judgement”, the editor of the Lancet medical journal has said.
Richard Horton said in Delhi that the name had unfairly stigmatised India. The Lancet journal published research last August about the bug’s discovery. UK researchers named the enzyme “New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase 1...
Private ICU rooms in hospitals aren't just a... →
Roughly three out of every 10 ICU patients wind up with some kind of infection during their hospital stay. Those infections make sick people sicker, keeping them in the hospital for an additional eight to nine days and adding an estimated $3.5 billion to the nation’s healthcare tab each year.
A $3.5-billion problem sure sounds daunting, but a new study suggests a straightforward solution: Make...
South Korea Burying Pigs Alive (OpposingViews) →
Officials in South Korea are piling pigs on top of each other in trucks, dumping thousands of them into mass graves, and burying them alive.
This atrocity is intended to control an outbreak of foot and mouth disease, but there is an inexpensive vaccine for the disease that the South Korean government refuses to use.
As many as 34,000 pigs have been killed in a single day. … the number of...
Flu: vulnerable patients 'being turned away from... →
Pregnant women, the elderly and vulnerable patients are being turned away from GP surgeries amid claims that doctors do not have enough flu vaccines.
As NHS hospitals struggle to cope with a surge flu cases, many surgeries have failed to order sufficient doses to combat this year’s outbreak. The problems are so severe in some areas that non-urgent operations have been cancelled.
Pregnant...
GOP bends its own new House rules (POLITICO) →
After calling for bills to go through a regular committee process, the bill that would repeal the health care law will not go through a single committee.
Despite promising a more open amendment process for bills, amendments for the health care repeal will be all but shut down.
After calling for a strict committee attendance list to be posted online, Republicans backpedaled and ditched that from...
Not flu, strep — and after 5-hr ER wait, septic... →
As his tiny daughter’s skin turned blotchy and her body went limp during a lengthy wait at Methodist Hospital’s emergency room, Ryan Jeffers panicked.
“This wasn’t a simple flu,” he said. “My daughter needed help.”
Little did he know that the girl was near death from a common infection that had invaded her blood and was raging out of control, ultimately...